Foreign Policy In Focus by Stephen Zunes March 23, 2003 [source]
There has been a real fear in recent months that the right-wing government of Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon might take advantage of the international focus on the U.S. invasion of Iraq to increase its repression in the occupied Palestinian territories of the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Few people realized, however, that one of the first casualties would be a young American. In December 2001, as violent Palestinian protests against the then 34-year Israeli occupation increased along with Israeli repression, the United States vetoed a UN Security Council resolution calling for the placement of unarmed human rights monitors in the occupied territories. In response, a number of pacifist groups from the United States and Europe began to send their own representatives to play the role of human rights monitors, even to the point of physically placing their bodies between the antagonists. Among these volunteers was Rachel Corrie, a 23-year-old student at the Evergreen State College in Olympia, Washington…